How can a designer improve their skills in your industry?

Derek Powazek’s Calling All Designers: Learn to Write! is, in my opinion, a classic. He ends the article with “Design is about communication, and it takes more than pixels to communicate”. Can’t get any truer than that (and reminds me of the discussion at Errol’s Beyond Graphic).

When it comes to running a business, attaining decent writing skills should be seriously considered. Face it, designers who cannot communicate adequately via the written word will make a dogs breakfast of looking professional.

Running a business involves a great deal of correspondence - emails, lengthly proposals, project agreements, and more. Seems logical that the better you write, the more confidence your clients will have in your business abilities.

Coming from another angle, even if writing skills are not exactly in the professional range, a designer / business owner who can recognise the ins and outs of good writing will be better placed to hire professional writers for future projects.

As before, I put the question on improving skills in the writing industry to writers.

Liz

Every person in my industry could improve by learning to listen and learning what the other jobs that connect to their own jobs entail. Often we face a choice of two ways of doing something. The two ways may not make a difference to us, but often they make a difference to another person in the process. Knowing what each person does can make a designer (or another) a hero. Working in such a way as to make other folks’ workload easier and lighter is highly appreciated. Understanding when I have to change copy, because facts have changed or a mistake was made makes a designer in my life an angel and someone I’ll look forward to working with next time. Helping me find solutions that get the text and design to work together, being a problem solver who sits on the same side of the table as I do, caring about what outcome I am going for, — then offering advice that will get me there — these are the thing that make a designer who feels like a partner in producing outstanding work together.

That designer gets the lighter me. I relax and enjoy the work. We even laugh while we work together. :)

ME (Liz) Strauss | Writer | Career coach | Strategic planner
Successful Blog | Letting Liz Be | Liz Strauss.com | The Blog Herald | Performancing.com | Write With ME

Roy

The designer should learn over time how to speak “writing” without an accent. What does the writer mean by narrative, by voice, by dialogue? The writer needs to know a bit about color, perspective, and white space. In other words, all artists need to be able to speak across the borders of their discipline.

Roy Peter Clark | America’s writing coach
Poynter Online - Writing Tools | Book: Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer

Tom

Writing’s like anything; you get better by reading great writers and writing.

Tom Chandler | copywriting : online/blogging : marketing plans
Chandler Writes. You Profit. | The Copywriter Underground

tom

Keep an open mind.

tom mullen | writer & proprietor
EXIT3A.com | ANONYMOUS, JR

Are you a designer on the lookout for writing resources? If so, and if you’ve missed it, the Resourceful Fridays have been loaded down with links to various writing helps.

Well, this part of the DWW series went rather quickly. Coming on Friday will be the summary of the writers section.

until the next
Designers WW,
cat